Plumage of the Smew and Crossbill. 451 



racters, and addressed, post paid, with billets, in the accus- 

 tomed manner, to the permanent secretary of the Society, at 

 Haarlem. 



SHORT COMMUNICATIONS. 



Plumage of the Smew Merganser.— I would remark that 

 the fact stated by my friend, Mr. Bartlett, at p. 398, of the 

 young male smew, is far from being of general occurrence, to 

 judge from a number of specimens which I have examined 

 late in the spring, with a view to ascertain whether they then 

 exhibited signs of moulting, (as in the golden-eye), which 

 proved not to be the case. The living specimen still in St. 

 James's Park certainly did not possess the marking adverted 

 to, during last summer, as I remember distinctly : it attained 

 its mature plumage at the autumn moult, which remained 

 unsullied until about six weeks ago, when it rapidly assumed 

 the colouring of the adult female, but without change of fea- 

 ther, as in the common duck and its allies), a metamorphosis 

 which also takes place in the male bay-breasted merganser, 

 (Mergus serrator), and doubtless in the large species, [M. 

 merganser) ; it is likewise effected very completely by the 

 common red-headed pochard, (Fuligula ferina). — E. Blyth. 

 —June 23rd, 1838. 



Plumage of the Crossbill. — I have just received three re- 

 cent specimens of the common crossbill, (obtained in Merton, 

 Surrey), all birds of the present season, the plumage of which 

 is especially interesting, as demonstrably establishing the 

 fact, stated by me on previous occasions, that the saffron tint, 

 commonly described as peculiar to the old males, is also 

 sometimes assumed at the first moult : while, on the other 

 hand, I have long since ascertained, from personal observa- 

 tion, that many of the old males re-acquire the red plumage, 

 which, in such specimens, is always much finer and more vi- 

 vid than the young once moulted. 



Of the three now before me, the first is a female, in the 

 striated nestling garb, unmingled with other feathers : the se- 

 cond a male, with a series of orange feathers on each side of 

 the breast, and a few elsewhere ; the rest unmoulted, and as 

 in the preceding : the third another male, in the plumage or- 

 dinarily described as that of the old bird only, but still retain- 

 ing many streaked nestling feathers on the belly and else- 

 where. The striated nestling garb of the male is considerably 



